


cottage season

by tincanspaceship



Category: Star Trek: Discovery
Genre: Angst, Fluff, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Horses, Philippa was the absolute best and you can quote me on that, Pike & Una Are Not Dating, Platonic Cuddling, in that order, no heterosexuality or neurotypicals in my star trek
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-11
Updated: 2019-10-11
Packaged: 2020-12-09 03:03:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,639
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20987771
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tincanspaceship/pseuds/tincanspaceship
Summary: Pike & Una get their yearly reunion with their Academy crew.What's left of it, anyway.





	cottage season

**Author's Note:**

> tw for mentions of alcohol

Una prods at the dying embers of the campfire with her pointed marshmallow-roasting stick. She coughs as the wind switches directions and diverts smoke directly into her face. Pike seems unfazed, slicing up his apple into cubes and offering it to the horse behind him. 

“Still in love with this little bastard?” Una says, gesturing at the horse with her stick. She flexes her toes, still sore from the animal’s step onto her fragile bones. 

Chris averts his gaze from her and opts to whisper ‘_ don’t listen to her, Junie, _’ into his horse’s neck. Una sighs. 

“That animal’s only nice to you, Chris, and you know it.” 

He ignores Una, stroking out the horse’s mane and continuing to press his face into the strong muscles of her neck while whispering comforts. 

Una turns over a charred log with her tool, staring at the glowing mosaic of embers along the underside. She pokes it, releasing tiny sparks. Her eyes follow their trail into the sky, going dark one by one. 

“My mama used to say they were fairies,” Pike says, quietly. “Microscopic fairies.” He wipes his knife on his leg and folds it up, gently placing a cube of apple into his mouth. 

“Huh,” Una responds, digging for more. Pike isn’t quite the biggest chatterbox when it comes to himself. 

“I believed her until I was eleven.”

Una snorts, stabbing at a fragile nub of charcoal. It crumbles into black dust. 

“Stop poking at the fire, One. It’s bad luck,” Chris warns, handing the remaining apple chunks to his horse, who chomps on them with renewed vigour. Una sighs, skeptical, but she tosses her stick away nonetheless. She dusts off her knees and stands. 

“I think I’ll head in for the night,” she says, gathering her coat from the stump she’d been sitting on. It smells like woodsmoke and dirt. 

"I'll be in soon," he assures, and she starts the short but treacherous trek up to the cottage.

"Why don't you just put in some goddamn stairs, Chris!" she shouts, after rolling her ankle for the third time today. His chuckle is audible even from her distance, and she rolls her eyes before stomping into the house. 

The screen door wobbles behind her as she peels off her boots and plunks them on the mat, inhaling the wood smell that permeates the entire cottage and everything within. 

She'll never admit it, but she likes it. 

Chris's promise of 'soon' gives her about thirty minutes until he says his last goodbye to his horses, so she takes the opportunity to use the shower that's either freezing or scalding, scrub the ash off her face, and try to get the lingering horse smell out of her hands (utterly impossible, even after several minutes of vigorous scrubbing). 

She finally wanders into the bedroom, changing into a pair of plaid pants and tossing on the nearest shirt, probably Pike’s, judging by the size. She readjusts Pike’s side of the bed, moving around the mussed blankets until they lay flat, before crawling into her side and cracking open her book again. 

Chris steps in as she’s halfway through a particularly sticky spot in the protagonists’ adventure, and she reluctantly places the hardcover back on her nightstand and waits for him to join her. Chris peels back the covers, slides in, and curls up on his side, letting Una nestle in behind him. She drapes her arm around his waist. He melts into it, and Una feels the tension in her shoulders loosen and her breathing stabilize. 

"Are you all right?" Chris asks, his hands resting over hers. "You seem tense."

"I'm just…tired," she offers, but she can feel Chris's eyebrow raise through her bones. He affixes himself to her more securely, running his thumb in circles over the back of her hand. 

"Don't lie to me, One."

Una sighs. “Tell me a story about Pippa, and Gabe, and Kat. I...it doesn’t feel right up here without them.”

Gabe’s been gone since the Buran, really. Not that they’d guessed he’d been from a different universe, but he’d been so different. 

Pippa, gone since the Shenzhou, since her heart was pierced with the cruel Klingon blade. 

Una remembers their yearly reunion after that. Just her and Kat and Chris and it had been altogether too quiet without Pippa’s cheerful, guiding rambles, and they’d just sat by the fire, her and Kat drinking various potencies of alcohol in increasing quantities as Pike drank much more responsibility and kept the flame going, and after the coals had gone dark they’d all piled into the bed (it had seemed too cramped, with all five, but with three it seemed too empty), and they’d sobbed, quietly, entwined with each other, feeling the absence of their missing friends like black holes

And then Kat, too.

Chris is crying, silently, and Una rubs her cheeks until the tears that have collected melt back into her skin. She laces her hand over his and squeezes it tight. 

“Do you remember,” she starts, in a crackling tone, her throat seizing.

_ “Pip, where’s my sweater?” Una asks, having barged right into Philippa’s quarters and immediately begun looking under desks. An action movie is playing on the holoscreen, and there’s the rustle of a few other people in the room. _

_ “...Nowhere,” Philippa says, crossing her arms over the front of her hoodie, awkwardly bracing a bowl of chips against her side. Una groans and looks up. _

_ Gabe’s fingers snap over the back of the couch before he twists around to look at Una. “Hey, One!” he announces, following it with a salute. Chris waves at her, and Kat seems too glued to the screen to look away. _

_ “Give me back my sweater, you ingrate.” _

_ Philippa sticks her tongue out, passing her bowl back to Gabe without looking. _

_ “Make me.” _

_ Una slings Philippa over her shoulder with no hesitation. Philippa yelps, pounding her fists against her back. Una pins her legs to keep her from kicking, walking over to her bed and depositing her squarely in the middle. Philippa giggles, her hair flying all over the place, crossing her arms over the sweater again. _

_ “Make me!” Philippa laughs, and Una grabs the hem of her hoodie, pulling it over Philippa's head. Philippa struggles with it, but her giggling forces her to stop. Una frees her sweater and strides out, leaving a wheezing Philippa behind her. _

Pike chuckles, weakly, and squeezes Una’s forearm. She sniffles. 

“Jesus, I miss that woman.”

Pike nods, wiping his eyes. “I’m sorry, One. I know how much you loved her. I miss her too.”

Una tightens her grip, squishing Pike like a teddy bear, pushing back tears. She curls around him, feeling his ribs under her hands, his tightened breathing. He intentionally goes limp, letting her press her face into his back and wrap her legs around him, clinging to him like a loved stuffed animal.

Philippa had pulled stoic young Una off to the side, told her to relax, and when Una physically couldn’t release the tension in her shoulders, carted her off to the infirmary, where they diagnosed her with a muscle disorder and helped her recover from its lasting effects, told her to speak to them if there was any muscle pain, the pain she’d been suffering from her entire life that she’d never once thought of as unusual. 

Philippa, too, had been the one to notice Una’s pent-up anxiety, notice that the perfectly ironed exterior was her trying to keep her mind inside her body. Philippa had been the one to speak with her, late on a Tuesday night, and pick away at her shell until Una had confessed her thoughts, the ones that made her nauseous and the ones that made her check under beds and open all her closets, the ones that made her scared of knives. Philippa was the person who brought her to a counselor at five in the morning, spoken to them about her theories, patiently sat outside their office for three and a half hours before Una left, diagnosed with obsessive-compulsive disorder and finally able to put a name to the thoughts that made her feel so ill inside. 

Pippa was the only person Una would cry in front of. Una’s had breakdowns in front of Philippa, her entire body shaking, her knees giving way, crying out for home. Pip would wrap her arms around her, guide Una’s head to her chest, hold it there gently and rock, back and forth, telling her to get it all out, to breathe, to count to six. 

Pippa’s heart was big enough for the both of them. She must not have had lungs, a liver, a stomach, a heavy, big heart taking up her entire abdominal cavity, full to the brim with affection, with love. 

It wouldn’t have been hard for a Klingon to land that final blow. 

Una releases Pike, fearful for the man’s lungs, and flips over, letting him tentatively switch positions with her. His arms drape around her ribs, and he slowly places his nose at the base of her neck. 

“Where’s this vulnerability when we’re on the bridge?” Pike teases. Una sighs. 

“Shut up and cuddle me, asshole, before you lose your chance,” Una grumbles, not wanting to admit she’s utterly enjoying it. “Do that thing Pippa did where she —“

Chris nods and runs his hands through her hair, carefully carding the strands, his fingers working to plait the ends of her hair. Una murmurs an assent, the slight tug of her forming braids a comfort. 

Pike finishes his two messy, lopsided braids. Una pulls them over her shoulders, running her thumb over the raised texture and pressing her eyes shut, hoping for Philippa to squeeze her tight to her chest and tell her it would be all right without her. 

  



End file.
